Problem Nine And Two
by crowind
Summary: AU. Three generations, four Hokage, and two jinchuuriki. The Senju are dying; an Uchiha holds the highest authority in Konoha. The only thing standing between the Kyuubi and Konoha is a teenager with a volatile temper. Tsunade has inherited her grandfather's spirit and her grandmother's demon, and the clans and village in between, and the fragile peace of the shinobi world.
1. The Fourth Hokage And The Demon Princess

_Thanks to roadkill2580 for allowing me to steal her ideas, and Hokuto and Sessalisk for beta-reading._

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In the sea of rust hung the moon in its infancy, dark and soothing. The demon fox lay, neither asleep nor awake. It stirred when the moon faltered and the sea raged, for the moon was only three blades spinning. The tide rose, and Tsunade with it, as a severed head might have floated to the surface.

She couldn't feel her limbs; the ANBU wouldn't give up their comfortable seats so easily. There was dirt in her nose and mouth, and with the steel grip on her head keeping it down she was literally eating dirt. But dirt and ashes were nothing compared to the stench of putrefying flesh, and for that brief moment when everything was red, Tsunade found herself sympathising with the demon's desire to cleanse everything with fire.

She could feel the demon grumbling behind her throat. Impotent for as long as Hokage-sama trained his fancy wheel eyes on them, it was left to claw on the wounds it'd made on her. Tsunade wished the Sharingan would just tell it to die, or failing that, tell her to. It wasn't that she had wanted to die, exactly, but in a village full of ninja, only Tsunade held the honourable title of human sacrifice. Before that, she was a shinobi of Konoha, the student of every Hokage since its founding. She had expected to fight for as long as she could, but there was never a doubt of her fate in the event the seal broke.

The pain eased somewhat when a familiar chakra came between them and snapped the fox's cage close. A whine escaped her throat; the ANBU's hand in her hair clenched warningly.

Hokage-sama was speaking. "I have to be sure the demon will not break free," he said, but not to her. Tsunade couldn't make out the words, but there was no mistaking Grandma's mumble in reply. It was all Grandma could do after the demon fox had ripped her from inside out. It was a miracle she could speak or walk at all. How dare they drag her into this mess, Tsunade thought.

Tsunade raised her head; the ANBU slammed it back down. Blood filled her mouth as her teeth cut her tongue. She heard Grandma rebuking the ANBU, and jerked her head up again, and got a cuff for her troubles, again.

It took a while for her head to stop spinning, and when she could see again there was an outline of a foot by her head. Tsunade closed her eyes, bracing herself for a kick that never came. The ANBU slowly and reluctantly peeled themselves off her. They remained within stabbing distance, vibrating with chakra and alarm as the Hokage helped her stand.

Tsunade looked away from Kagami's stupid wheel eyes. There was a crater nearby. The broken body inside had been removed, but the blood had not, as if to leave an evidence to charge her with. There was Grandma, leaning on her cane and a lean, silver-haired ANBU, well outside the human cage. Worry was writ large in her frail frame and Tsunade had never felt more wretched. She looked away.

Her stupid teammates were missing, though. Tsunade tried not to think of how striking blood had looked on Orochimaru's deathly pallor. Where was Orochimaru? Jiraiya, she wasn't worried for so much as resigned, because only Jiraiya could be stupid enough to get himself into trouble after escaping another.

Kagami's answer came slowly under the watch of dark, forbidding eyes. "Jiraiya is with Orochimaru at the hospital. And perhaps you should be as well, Tsunade." He was looking at her feet. Confused, Tsunade followed his gaze, and was reminded of the sword that had gone through her heart (and before that, Orochimaru's torso. She really ought to see him). If there had been a wound there, it no longer hurt, though it was understandably hard to see through the blood—hers and the ANBU's and Orochimaru's, quite the party.

"It doesn't hurt, but, Ka–Hokage-sama, what about Kabema?" Kagami's surprise irked her more than being handled like a rabid beast or a renegade shinobi, or some horrid combination of the two. Give her a little credit, eh. "Senju Kabema, that ANBU over there? He's dead, isn't he?"

Of course he was. Even if she hadn't remembered breaking her cousin with bare hands, she was still wearing his blood. A new chuunin vest just for me, she thought sardonically, desperate to ignore her churning stomach.

"Did you kill him?" Kagami sounded just like her little brother. Nawaki had the annoying habit of asking the questions he knew the answer to, as though with persistence his chores would vanish. He had seen the body, had seen Tsunade and immediately subdued her, did he think she would deny it just because he'd asked?

"He tried to kill me, and Orochimaru too, since he got in the way. So… I suppose I did."

The ANBU went very, very still, suddenly abuzz with chakra that pricked at her skin, and filled her nose with an unholy mix of rotten fruit and bleach. She coughed, but Kagami only said, "Is that so."

Tsunade glared up at him. "You should have ordered me, Hokage-sama. Would've got the job done without any of the mess."

Kagami sighed. Slowly his features melted into a resemblance of the man who was as close to a favourite cousin as an Uchiha could be. "Tsunade," he said as to an unruly child, "No one has ordered your death, and no one will as long as I am the Hokage. But I must have all the facts before I am to decide on anything. So please, tell me what happened."


	2. Radical Dreamers

**_Beta-reading credits: Hokuto and Sessalisk._**

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"… So there we were, minding our own business, you know, innocuous genin stuff, waiting for Hokage-sensei to arrive, 'cuz he's late again. And then all of a sudden, like a sword in the night, out from the blue sky dropped a rogue ANBU! He struck at O-himesama, but quick Orochimaru used his body to shield her! But he underestimated her! Filled with grief and vengeance, O-himesama drew on an unprecedented hidden power and unleashed punishing righteous fury on the perpetrator!"

Trust Jiraiya to take an audience with the Hokage to mean an audience in the Hokage Tower. Tsunade's fist itched. The last thing she needed was for the whole world—the Hokage, his ANBU Commander, the head of her clan, and Grandma, so the whole world—to think she'd revelled in the demon's power. Kagami, who'd had previous exposure to Team Sarutobi, didn't so much as raise an eyebrow. The current head of the Senju Touka-sama, who hadn't had such exposure, turned her glare at Tsunade. "Is this true?"

Kagami unsteepled his fingers. "Jiraiya's account matches with what Tsunade has told me earlier, I see no reason to doubt him."

"Of course. And they are such good comrades to our Tsunade."

"You implyin' something, lady," Jiraiya began before Tsunade stepped on his toes.

"Not at all. Only my gratitude for your support of her, even now. And I do remember being so young, and thinking innocent what could easily pass as aggression."

"Shut up," hissed Tsunade, and Jiraiya did, scowling.

Kagami had no such inclination. "I, for one, would like to know why one of my ANBU, who so happens to be Tsunade's kin, would feel compelled to attack her. Tsunade." Kagami's deep voice sharpened around the edge—his Hokage voice, the one clear advantage over his predecessor. It had the uncanny effect of making her holding her breath and standing ramrod straight and. "Did you use the demon's power at all, especially prior to your confrontation with Kabema?"

Straightforward, but airtight questions. Kagami knew her so well. She told him. She fully understood that due to the rawness of her seal she had been restricted from using chakra. As a shinobi of Konoha, even a chuunin, Tsunade couldn't bear being useless. She'd had excellent chakra control, surely she could manage without drawing the demon's power, which was after all chakra like any other. She'd started small, and thus discovered that Sarutobi's seal was as effective as a piece of paper against a deluge.

"I stopped as soon as I sensed its contamination," she insisted. She'd meant to, and would have had no issue but for Kabema. It occurred to her that maybe, just maybe, it had ended so tragically for her cousin precisely because the demon's chakra had been on the tips of her fingers, quite literally. But the Hokage wouldn't be interested in speculations.

Touka-sama, unfortunately, was. "So it was always under your control. And with Kabema… self-defence? Your body moved on its own, because your comrade and yourself were harmed?"

Tsunade pre-emptively stepped on Jiraiya's toes. Touka-sama was as patronising as she was accurate. Orochimaru would scoff at the idea of apologising for self-defence, even murder in self-defence. Faced with Touka's thinning lips and inhuman calm, Tsunade couldn't. Here was someone who definitely believed otherwise. Here was the one person who deserved an apology, and since Kabema wasn't available, it fell to Tsunade to make it.

She bowed from her waist. "Touka-sama, words cannot express how sorry I am. I never meant to kill Kabema-oniisan."

"But you did, and now he's dead, and you think an apology could make up for it. Save your bowing for someone who cares, girl."

Cold wind raged in her bones so suddenly she forgot to breathe. Then a moment later it was gone, leaving Tsunade wondering… not genjutsu, not in front of the Hokage, even if Touka was a master of that art. More artefacts of the demon? Touka's voice was just as cold, and when Tsunade dared to look up she saw the profile of a long column of ice. Tsunade blinked. It was only Touka's slender neck, riddled as it was with stark blue veins.

"But, Kagami," Grandma said from the back. Aside from the Hokage, only she was allowed a seat. No wonder Grandma had always liked Kagami best of her husband's students. Presently, Grandma mustered her strength to say, "Is it possible for your ANBU to have… misconstrued your instructions?"

"No," Kagami said curtly. "As I told Tsunade, there was never an order to kill, under whatever circumstances, without my explicit permission."

"That seems unwise, Hokage-sama," Touka-sama muttered, now sufficiently collected.

"My understanding was that the seal should have been impossible to break without drastic measures." Was he glaring at Tsunade? "Sabotage by a highly skilled enemy shinobi, to end in a certain death for the host." Yes, he was.

Tsunade looked away. Kagami's eyes might have been all the colours of the rainbow and she would always see the dark blades whirling on crimson field. She saw his arms crossed and uncrossed, then his head tilted ever so slightly, as if listening to the whispered wisdoms of the Hokage past. His chair creaked. It looked old, and a fair bit shorter than the chair she was used to. Grandpa's old chair, she realised, the Takigakure import which Saru-sensei had traded for one more suitable for his height.

Incidentally, Grandma said, "That is how Hiruzen intended it… poor boy, he gave his life for it."

"Yes, well, my predecessor was never known for his fuuinjutsu." Again with playing peek-a-boo with the old Kagami. The Hokage hid his grimace behind steepled fingers, then lifted his chin. "Mito-sama and I will look into it later. For now, let me see if I understand this correctly: ANBU Senju Kabema noticed the demon's chakra stirring and jumped the blade, injuring chuunin Orochimaru in the process. Chuunin Senju Tsunade reacted in self-defence, leading to the ANBU's death."

Kagami paused, but Tsunade wasn't going to tell him that Kabema hadn't been known as a sensor. Anyway, Touka-sama seemed suspiciously serene. The Hokage went on. "Sparring accidents happen, so do disastrous awakenings of volatile kekkei genkai, though perhaps not always as tragic.

"Tsunade, I'm putting you on indefinite suspension from any and all missions—yes, even D-rank missions. You are forbidden from training alone. I will personally supervise your efforts to control the demon. And you will control it."

Or die trying, Hokage-sama? Tsunade looked past his shoulder and out the great window overlooking the village, at the stone image of her grandfather, the half of his lower jaw that remained. She voiced her acceptance; the Hokage didn't need it but Touka-sama did. All things considered, Tsunade had gotten off lightly. A barely perceptible nod, and she was dismissed while the adults finagled.

It didn't occur to her until much later that Touka-sama might have been smarting from an Uchiha, even if he was the Hokage, meddling in Senju business. Jiraiya, whom Tsunade had almost forgotten, had a different perspective. "Man, what's her problem? Some clan head, trying to get Hokage-sensei to execute you."

"Eh," Tsunade said, glaring half-heartedly at the silver-haired ANBU following her. There were more hanging around, invisible but not bothering to conceal their sulphuric trail.

Tsunade halted so suddenly Jiraiya gave her a look. "Shouldn't you be at the hospital—"

"No!" she said. Jiraiya merely looked worried, she reasoned, but not freaked out, so she hadn't grown a fox snout or anything. Calmer now, she said, "I mean, I'm good… and if it's about Orochimaru, no way they'd be done with him. Anyway, you shut up and stay out of this. It was her son, and Touka-sama only had the one."

With the ANBU Silver Rat at her back, Tsunade managed to pass the major streets of Konoha without the Uchiha-crested police descending on her. At noon only shadows roamed the Senju's complex, and she evaded all the well-meaning, but nosy few staying at home. Neither Grandma nor Nawaki had returned. Silver Rat didn't follow her inside, but he and the other ANBU took positions around her house.

She slipped into her room. Soiled clothes went into the trash bin and Tsunade to the bed. She had just enough care to throw on something cleaner and untie the tangle of flaxen mop her hair had become. Finally, she laid down. Not to sleep, but a few seconds of shuteye couldn't hurt…

There was moonlight in her eyes, glittering hoarfrost of the night falling through trees, alighting on her hair, dull embers of a dying flame. Fire had raced through her breast, and she had borne it in her veins, allowed it to consume until all was ash. Ashes were her limbs, scattered uselessly to the four winds, on her tongue as her fingers clutched at air. The door had closed behind him; his brother's shadow, so easily forgotten in the heat, loomed large over them with the return of light. She was cold, every beat was a hammer to her heart. So it was shame her bedfellow, and contempt fuel for light, until the next …

The door slammed open. Tsunade started. She blinked against the sunlight filtering through the curtains. It was noon, and her little brother was trying to get her attention.

"Nee-chan, why're you sleeping in the afternoon? Why's your face all red? Nee-chan, are you sick? Injured? No? But there's blood in your hair and why didn't you take a bath before sleeping, that's gross! Where's Baa-chan?"

Tsunade caught his hand. However hard she blinked, purple dots persisted on Nawaki's face. She rose, pulled him closer and, ignoring his protests, lifted his shirt, in an instant wide awake. His right eye was swollen shut, and his face and torso were mottled with bruises.

"Really, Nawaki? School started just a few months ago," she grumbled under her breath. Without thinking, she started to heal him only to abort as red crept into her vision. The distraction allowed Nawaki to squirm out of her grasp.

"It's nothing! But Sensei wants to see Baa-chan, but I couldn't find her. Hey, Nee-chan, you're a chuunin, aren't you? So that makes you an adult, so you can talk to Sensei, right?"

"What kind of logic is that?" Tsunade grumbled. She couldn't argue against the absence of a more suitable person for the task, however, so she threw him out. She hastily scrubbed the remaining bloodstains, gave up in disgust and rolled the rest into a messy bun, and changed into something more suitable for receiving guests. By then her face had cooled, and she had almost forgotten about the dream.

Nawaki's teacher was waiting in the living room, his tea no longer steaming. Tsunade vaguely remembered him from her short stint at the Academy, mostly because he was one of the few who'd protested when Sarutobi-sensei had come to collect his genin cell. When told that Grandma wasn't available, he said, "That's quite all right, I can wait. That is, if you don't mind," he said, blandly nodding to Tsunade.

While she hesitated, Nawaki said, "Nee-chan's a chuunin, just like you, Sensei! Same rank and everything, so you can just talk to her, right?"

The teacher gave her an appraising gaze. "This is true. Then, Nawaki-kun, please demonstrate for your sister." With one last anxious look at Tsunade, Nawaki held a piece of paper between his fingers—a chakra testing paper. He made the tiger seal, eyes closed and face scrunched in deep concentration. The paper crinkled and twisted and hardened, and seconds later he was holding a fresh branch between his fingers. She recognised the type: blood sandalwood, the same wood as beneath her legs and above her head. It was Grandpa's signature, if she hadn't known already from the red tinting the edge of her vision, or the urge to snarl. Shut up, fox.

Nawaki was anxiously watching her staring at the branch. His face fell when she turned to the teacher and said, "Wasn't there a fight, Sensei?" She'd bet there had been bullies, and being a boy raised on the heroic deeds of their grandfather, Nawaki had tried to fight them off. And probably lost, and now he wouldn't meet her eye, as if Tsunade cared about winning.

The teacher took a sip of his tea before answering. "There was a… squabble that started between Nawaki-kun and Hatake Sakumo-kun, although by the time the mokuton manifested it had become bigger."

"And this Hatake Sakumo is…"

"I gather it was not the first time that Nawaki-kun has taunted Sakumo-kun, although this is the first time he's instigated a physical fight."

The fox had tampered with her sight and smell, why not hearing too? Yet she was awake, and Nawaki didn't object. Instead he continued to study the crude leaf-spiral his toddler self had etched into the table.

The teacher said, not unkindly, "Sakumo-kun is an excellent student and a respectful classmate. By all accounts, he has never deliberately tried to provoke Nawaki-kun. I'm afraid the instigator was, and always has been, Nawaki-kun. But that is not why I'm here, Tsunade-hime.

"The Academy takes the education of young shinobi very seriously. Our policy is to allow students to resolve differences among themselves, and only to step in when a harmful pattern persisted. Now, this is only one incidence, and I am confident it will never happen again. It is also the Academy's policy to discuss with the student's family in the event that a kekkei genkai manifested, so as to arrange a proper training."

Training was the furthest thing from her mind, but Tsunade managed, "I'll, uh, I don't think Nawaki needs any special treatment or training or whatever from the Academy."

"Very well. Then I thank you for your hospitality. Please give my regards to Mito-sama." He rose. Tsunade had the presence of mind to drag Nawaki with her to see his teacher off.

"Nee-chan, can you let me go now?" Nawaki whined once he was out of earshot.

"No." She herded him back inside and told him to fetch the medical kit. Back in his room, she poked him into taking off his shirt. A bit more prodding got him to stand still while she applied salve on his bruises. She could do without the pouting, though. "Stop that, do you want to be stuck looking like a duck forever?" Tsunade sighed. "Look, I'm not gonna yell at you." That was Grandma's job, although Grandma preferred frosty, reproachful silence. "Just tell me what the hell has Hatake Sakumo ever done to you. Turn around, let me see your back."

Maybe the Hatake kid was a little prick. Tsunade could sympathise with wanting to knock a few teeth out once certain lines were crossed (and at his age, she had). Her optimism was dashed, first by the scowl she could feel radiating off his scalp, and then, "He looks at me funny! He thinks he's so much better than everyone, but he's just a–ow, Nee-chan!"

"Done." She capped the salve, snatched the first clean shirt she saw on the bed and tossed it haphazardly on his head. "Just a civilian kid, eh?" Tsunade hadn't known any shinobi clan with that name. Well, not 'just', she thought, counting almost a dozen of kid-sized welts on Nawaki's back alone. "Okay, but did you at least win?"

"He's gotta be cheating! And then the teachers stopped us when I was winning," he said from within the shirt.

"Yeah, sure he was." Tsunade stood and shoved the kit into his hands. Six, and not even reaching past her waist. Her little bully. Red mist seeped through her teeth and curled under her eyes. She saw Nawaki's eyes widened, and spat, "That's O-jiichan's powers you bullied a civilian kid with, and even then you still got your ass beat. Face it, you're pathetic."

Tsunade didn't trust herself to leave her room until the red cleared, and by then it was past afternoon. Grandma still hadn't returned. She couldn't care less about Nawaki; the kid was old enough to beat a civilian to pump his big head, he could take care of himself. Anyway he was not wanting: the Academy was too eager to look the other way, and the clan would be all too happy to pick up the slack. Finally a descendant of Hashirama who turned out right, eh, and of course it would be the boy. All the women in his family were demons.

Grandma came home around the evening, escorted by an ANBU and Nawaki. His chatter died when he saw Tsunade through the study's open doors. Mumbling to Grandma, he disappeared into his room. Grandma, meanwhile, hobbled inside and declined when Tsunade offered Grandpa's masterpiece, his throne which she'd been sitting on, and opting for the other relic, a gift from the Shodai Takikage. It creaked ominously as she leaned forward on her cane, faint lines spoiling her otherwise smooth forehead as she regarded Tsunade's work. "Practicing your sutures, Tsunade?"

"Kid outgrows everything the moment he wears them." Tsunade folded the shirt and packed the sewing kit more noisily than was necessary. "What with my being suspended indefinitely—so never ever taking missions again—and Nawaki far too young to take missions, I can't just buy new stuff all the time."

Grandma's features softened somewhat. "My dear, you fret too much. Your Kagami-sama will never let us starve, and neither is Touka-san a cruel woman. In fact, I am to remind you that she will be expecting your presence at the funeral tomorrow."

"Thought I should save the apology for someone who cares?" There it was, Grandma's frosty reproach. Tsunade spread her hands in surrender. "Of course I'll be there. Let the whole clan know I'm a kin slaughterer, keeps everyone on their toes. And maybe remorse will bring Kabema-niisan back, how about that."

Grandma didn't slouch, ever, but as she sighed and sat back she looked like iron forged the wrong way, hammered thin and folded to the point of breaking. Tsunade forced her jaws to unclench, even sketched a girlish smile. "Joking, Baa-chan, just a thoughtless joke as usual."

"Was it also a joke that my grandson now believes everything is permissible so long as he has the strength? That is not how I raised you. Is something wrong?"

Tsunade turned her shudder into a shrug at the last moment. Grandma's lips were like rusty doors, creaking open and shut with each breath. Shut up, fox. "I didn't mean it like that. Anyway, Nawaki doesn't listen to me, so no harm done."

Grandma shook her head. "This coming year Nawaki will be seven, and by then, he thinks, he must be inducted as a genin, as his sister before him. So if he doesn't listen, he's only following your excellent example."

"But I've never told him anything like that." Though as she protested, Tsunade began wondering if she had, even if unconsciously, imposed such an impossible standard. Not necessarily, she decided, kids generated weird ideas about the world on their own. "Fine, I'll talk to him tomorrow."

Grandma said nothing. If a moth wandered in, it would be cut by the silence in the library. Tsunade exhaled. "Well, good night, Baa-chan."

She rose and went around the desk and past Grandma, freezing when Grandma raised a hand to her cheek. Her skin crawled and clawed to escape from Grandma's caress.

"Is your grandmother so repulsive to you?" Grandma said.

Tsunade ducked and turned away. Her teeth itched for the crone's flesh. She would have chewed her own hand if Grandma hadn't said, "Do you hate me, Tsunade?"

"No!" Tsunade said, aghast. "How could you think that?"

Grandma gave her a wry look. "I had borne the demon fox long before your mother was a thought. I know that presently it is tampering with your senses. Sensibilities, too. Even now you don't think to ask for my help. Allow me."

A storm was brewing inside her, but Tsunade forced her head down between Grandma's hands. Once again her chakra came between Tsunade's and the fox. Tsunade might as well have gone blind and deaf, but it was a blissful silence and stillness, punctuated only by Grandma's soothing voice.

"You are now a jinchuuriki, a girl sacrificed to contain the primordial spirit of malice and disaster. You will know more than you ever wish of the depravity of mankind, its passion and lust, the depths we will sink to, and all the petty justifications thereof. Nevertheless, however I deserve it you must not hate. I do not tell you this for my own sake, but for Konoha's, and yours most of all." Grandma patted her cheek. "You're not listening."

Tsunade opened her eyes, smiling sheepishly. "I was. I'm… sorry for not asking you first before experimenting with the fox. But it wasn't because I hated you. I could never hate you, Baa-chan."

"Not even a little, for making you bear all the punishment for my sins?"

Grandma had a knack for saying dramatic, even hysterical things, and making Tsunade take her seriously anyway. "Just… maybe a bit angry, 'cause if Sarutobi-sensei hadn't acted quickly you'd've left Nawaki growing up without any adults," Tsunade muttered.

Grandma made a small noise—a snort, really, except she made everything seemed more dignified. "Just Nawaki?" And she sobered quickly. "I wonder if today's tragedy could have been avoided had I insisted on teaching you." Tsunade opened her mouth, but Grandma tapped both cheeks. "Not now, Tsunade. I'm tired. Come help your grandmother to bed."

Shortly before his death, in the last days of peace before war engulfed the world, Granduncle had once said Grandpa built his house like his village: grown from the seed of hope on the humble soil of earth. There was only one floor, which was a boon to Grandma in her current state, and there were always more rooms than people. Nawaki's room was quiet and dark. Tomorrow then, after all.

Grandma didn't want the lights turned on; the moon was out, fat and generously shining through the trees. Tsunade unwound the obi, then the hair, tumbling out in a cascade of red, thinner than it once had been. But no less radiant, she thought while absently teasing out the tangles. Mother had had the same, and young Tsunade had loved running her hand through it. Silky flames, flecked with the glittering hoarfrost come down from the moon…

"Tsunade," Grandma said as though she had called her for the hundredth time.

She shook out the image and answered, "Oh, sorry. Your hair's just so amazing, Baa-chan. Why couldn't O-kaasan have passed it to either of her children?" Grandma just snorted.

Tsunade bounced off the bedside, not for the first time noting its size. Grandma only ever used one side. The other she kept pristine, the shrine to Grandpa they otherwise wouldn't have. Scrolls and books and even clothes cluttered the remaining space, but there was not a single thing she could conscientiously call decoration. Too big for one person, Tsunade thought. "Do you want me to sleep here for the night?"

"Tsuna-chan, you're not a child anymore," Grandma chided even as she used her childhood nickname. Grandma fell quiet, then pointed her cane at a pile of ink—Grandma's attempts at reclaiming her lost mastery, she realised with a pang. "O-jiichan's book, to help you sleep. Now go bounce in your own room."

Some days Grandma's omniscience would annoy her. This time Tsunade dug said book out of the pile and almost forgot to say goodnight in her haste to return to her room. Once there she swept the clutter on her desk to the floor and set the book down with an uncharacteristic reverence. For it was the book Grandpa had written, a thing she never could have imagined would exist. Shinobi, as a rule, did not write anything of import down. Everything that was worth passing down was worth oral teaching from one generation to the next. But she had in her hand whatever the god of shinobi found important to write, and his wife the consummate scholar to pass to Tsunade.

Her excitement lasted only an hour and a book, evaporating into the feeling of having watched a squirrel zip from one tree to another, stopping only long enough to pluck a nut at each only to abandon it. No wonder Grandma lent it to her. It was an interesting glimpse at the world, to be sure. Shinobi clans, including the Senju, had been nomadic before the revolution of shinobi villages. Fearing raids, they would move at unpredictable seasons, and even the smallest of clans had an outpost or two. Grandpa had once lived that lifestyle, and he always found something new and exciting in each place. The problem was only Grandpa would find them new and exciting. When there was a giant slug thingy (Grandpa's words) in the area, only Grandpa would choose to catalogue all the trees in the forest because it was an impossibly humid forest.

She let the book languish in her disappointment for a moment. She had… well she didn't have anything to do tomorrow, or the rest of her life. Tsunade took out a pen and began working. True to Grandma's prediction, she spent the night putting the book through every cypher she knew of. There had to be something in the middle of all the trees, even if sometimes it seemed Grandpa lived in a world of trees…

The leaves swayed long after the wind stopped blowing. They had him cornered, her siblings and her in a neat circle around the human. And should he sprout wings and escape by air, well, they had a sibling just for that. She snapped pearly teeth at air, sharp and each about as long as the man's blade, a metallic toothpick as far as she was concerned. She could break him, each of them could a thousand times over, and the man knew it, she could smell it about him: fear, hatred even at this time, and something rank and uniquely him.

She had nothing but contempt for this puny creature before her, petty whims and selfish desires wrapped in cheap iron and an accident of birth that somehow enthralled the other puny creatures to debase themselves before him. Not that she cared. These petty creatures calling themselves humans could exterminate themselves as far as she and her siblings were concerned. But Father did, noble and compassionate Father, whose dignity so far outstripped anything on earth. And Father had gone and prostrated himself before this man, even begged for him to see reason. Father might have left his ideals at whims of a man, but she was not so sanguine, and neither were her siblings.

But a voice called for their names one by one, and she obliged, snapping her teeth as a warning for one last time. Father walked like the common man he was not, and he even apologised to the ungrateful sod, and invited him to his home. The children were strictly and explicitly forbidden to join. The meeting bore nothing. The man was free to go home, to mount his forces to their doom, the exact thing Father was exhorting him against. The whole farce was so preposterous it pained her, and she said so to Father.

And Father looked at her with eyes that defied age, and he said things to her, things that made her, for that brief moment, to share his hope and compassion and faith, but she was already falling…

It was sunset, and the sky was bleeding into the sea. Where the sky ended the sea began, and thus awakened, the sea raged. Little storms roared all around, whirling themselves into a deafening frenzy. Somewhere in there was Tsunade, dazed and stuck figuring out where exactly she was, in the sky, with the sun, looking down at the whirlpools? Among the waters, and yet also apart from it? Ah, Tsunade thought, this must be what gives Uzushiogakure its name. Grandma had always said she was not her granddaughter until Tsunade had seen the sunset at Uzushiogakure.

The sea gurgled, and the whirlpools coalesced into eyes and a row of teeth. "You!" gurgled the Kyuubi. She hoped it was the demon fox itself, because she didn't think she could handle more than one parasite at a time. The sea raged anew, and she was snatched in its waves. Tsunade felt sick being thrashed by the current. "Get out!" the Kyuubi shrieked, and with a violent jerk, Tsunade was thrusted into darkness.

For a few moments she blinked groggily at the soft light of her desk lamp, then Tsunade had just enough presence of mind to turn her head and vomit on her floor instead of Grandpa's book. The Kyuubi gave her one last kick to the spleen, and she spent most of the night kneeling on the floor wheezing and cursing Sarutobi-sensei for his ineptitude.


	3. Access

Tsunade entered the hospital the second it was open to visitors. The nurses were finishing their rounds, many plastering their faces to their charts when she passed. Well, never mind, she wasn't here for herself. It was less ignorable when she asked the receptionist for Orochimaru's room and was summoned the director of the hospital herself.

She said, "I'm afraid I must ask you to leave."

"I… beg your pardon?" Tsunade said, straining to understand the meaning under the director's buzzing. An Aburame by marriage, she hadn't gotten her position by annoying people on whimsy, but Tsunade's hackles rose anyway. _Shut up, fox, this is too early for your nonsense._

"Orochimaru-kun is not yet capable of receiving visitors; he was admitted with a severe case of meridian necrosis in addition to the stab wound." She needn't explain more: often fatal in civilians or crippling as in Grandma's case, and almost exclusively caused by the Kyūbi's chakra.

Except Tsunade hadn't even touched Orochimaru while the red chakra coursed through her. Except under the soft light of the morning her memory was a pale thing. Easier to doubt awkward and macabre Orochimaru had used his body to shield her. Maybe Kabema had been defending Orochimaru from Tsunade.

The director was still talking, and her tongue was a broken wing desperate to take flight. She was saying, probably, "Not all the victims of the Kyūbi's attack last week have recovered yet. I'm sure you understand – you were an excellent medic-nin, for your age – for their and your friend's sake, it's best that you leave."

Outside, Tsunade ran into Jiraiya, who twirled out of the way. Claws shot out and clamped around his wrist anyway. Momentum kept her towing until she no longer felt like she was about to spew blood. There was a park near the hospital, where a giant sandalwood tree enjoyed its reputation as the first tree the Shodai Hokage planted. It stank of sulphur, as if to remind her that privacy was a privilege, and that she no longer had it.

"Excuse you, princess," said Jiraiya, and reminded, she dropped her hold. Fingers, she had fingers, not claws.

"Shut up," Tsunade said distractedly. "Just tell me the truth. Did I… touch Orochimaru?" Jiraiya raised an eyebrow. "With the Kyūbi's chakra, you perverted giant bleached beanstalk."

"If it's those stupid ANBU giving you a hard time – "

"It's not," Tsunade said, and explained as simply as she could get away with.

The colour drained from Jiraiya's face, but he gamely said, "Eh, like I said, Orochimaru's too weird to die the human way. Like, did he ever show you his tongue technique? I'm not supposed to tell you, but – "

"I'll show you where to put your stupid tongue," Tsunade snarled. She pinched her nose; it didn't help with sting of enbalming sticking to the roof of her mouth.

Jiraiya, for his part, looked past her shoulder. "See, it looked like you were trying to heal him, yeah? 'Cuz that's what you always do for us. So when he got worse I just sorta assumed the sword was poisoned."

For a moment there was only the wind. The clouds parted, allowing shadows to suddenly sprang from under their feet. Jiraiya swore. "I'm supposed to leave in the afternoon," he explained, grin flaring like a peacock's tail. "B-rank, just me and a princess. Oh, and a jōnin, but details."

"So? A promotion to chūnin means you're qualified to lead a squad. We were never meant to stay in our genin team forever. But then, I suppose not all of us is ready. Bet you your entire fortune you haven't even packed."

Jiraiya frowned. "You know, since I'm going to Uzushio and all I was gonna be nice and ask what you'd want, but suit yourself."

"I have family there anyway, don't pull your niceness fibres on my behalf." Family that she had never known, but he didn't have to know that.

Jiraiya stuck his tongue and turned to leave. Good riddance. Flaunting his privileges one second and the next upset she didn't praise him for leaving her with her little furry problem and their almost-dead third member. Yes, good riddance to Jiraiya and Orochimaru, pests both.

Tsunade blinked once, twice, thrice. She took a deep breath, then two. In between being horrified that she was fast turning into an emotional goop, and trying very hard not to imagine that inevitability, she called Jiraiya. He paused mid-stride, one knee held aloft in air. "Don't… Don't do anything that would embarrass Saru-sensei, yeah? And if you join Orochimaru in the hospital, I swear I'll make sure you stay there for a year."

Jiraiya executed an impressively smooth twirl and bow, not that she'd ever tell him so. The peacock grin was back, and he said, "Fear not, my flat-chested princess, I, the gallant Jiraiya, shall – " A pebble whizzed past his ear. "Okay, okay, I'm going already."

Under her glare his shadow vanished into the clouds as surely as the ANBU's hung onto her. Tsunade muttered, "I don't suppose Hokage-sama wants me right now?" and, as expected, received no answer. No training, no medical anything, and at this hour her grumpy duckling wasn't home yet to distract her. She was tired, but falling into deep sleep always plunged her into the red seas. She could pull herself awake for now, but maybe one day she would open her eyes to a red world. Tsunade shuddered at the thought.

A gaggle of women followed her back to the Senju complex – or she had followed them, rather. Chattering amongst themselves, gawking and pointing at everything, they could only be tourists. Tsunade spent an entirely too much time trying to predict their stories based on their accent and fashion style. The capital, merchants' wives or merchants themselves, recklessly entering coming into a shinobi village without any escort. Randomly they veered to the west – Tokuma-san's bakery shop, she guessed, if anything in the Senju district was ever a tourist trap it was that. Tsunade kept straight. From then it was blissful silence and solitude, until she reached her destination.

"Yo, Tsunade-hime," said Ryūnosuke, red-faced and nearly planting his face as he rose. His red-nosed buddy, Seima, continued singing out-of-tune snatches of bawdy songs. Ryūnosuke shouted over him, "Come join Ryū-jichan for a drink!"

"Horndog," Seima said. He tried slapping Ryūnosuke and missed by an arm's length, and hit Ryūnosuke's cane.

Tsunade sighed and greeted them and excused herself, all of which were ignored as the two old men argued over who should have died to Iwa. She went around Seima's house. The clan archives was a tiny outhouse attached to the dwelling of the current maintainer. Tsunade had always thought of it as a shrine. One went in, hands clasped in prayer, and with some luck came out with a smattering of wisdom among the dust.

She found Tatema inside, balancing a pyramid of scrolls in his arms. Tatema was a decent sensor, a trait most useful for identifying visitors without turning around and knocking into stuff. He said, "Hello, Tsunade-hime. On scale from a cat on catnip to the beggar god, how drunk is my father?"

"He was snatching Ryūnosuke-san's cane just fine."

"Give him five more seconds." He looked around, where there was a distinct lack of empty space, and clucked his tongue pensively.

"I can help," offered Tsunade.

"Oh. I was… Yes, if you would be so kind as to wipe the shelves while I sort these…"

There was only one case on each side, but she could not reach the top shelves even with a stepladder. An Academy brat would simply walk up the wall. Tsunade was reduced to flogging at imaginary Kyūbi and Sarutobi-shaped dust bunnies.

"I saw some ladies from the capital just now," she said, because silence was annoying. "Is it just me, or do we have more tourists than clan lately?"

"Mm… Just the season. It's almost summer up at Uzushio… But to what do I owe this pleasure, Tsunade-hime? Did you change your mind about books?"

"Nope! I came to see you, Tatema-niisan. Books are boring. They're dead and don't talk to each other, but you're smart and you synthesise 'em into something a plebeian can understand."

Tatema chuckled. Sunlight gleamed off his bald head, making stark the absence of the beard he'd been trying to grow ever since he could. "All right, what do you want synthesised?"

Tsunade hadn't dared to sleep after last night's dream, and wound up thinking too much about the Kyūbi instead. It was not mindless, though it perceived everything of humanity as trash. The demon was almost self-righteous in its hatred. But the same dream was also a cherished moment, and if so, there had been a beloved someone. Or someones – what if there were more demons like it? There was a demon in her belly and she didn't know anything about it, and Tsunade intended to change that.

Tatema was silent for so long that she tensed, prepared for flight. But then he spoke, "There's not much, I'm afraid. It's all old wives' tale – be good or the Kyūbi no Yōko will gobble you; where the heaven is crooked the demon fox grows fat – punishment from the gods for decadent and depraved civilisations. Whatever it is, no shinobi has fought it and lived to tell the tale. Until the venerable Mito-sama, that is."

"Really?"

"Even among the Uzumaki, Mito-sama is considered a master; not even Kabema would contest that." Tsunade looked up at his wistful note, but Tatema seemed keen on the closed scroll in his hand.

"He's your friend," Tsunade said in a small voice. It was coming back to her now. Tatema and Kabema and another cousin long dead, three lanky boys with heads bent together in their own corner while the adults carried on. More people to apologise to. More people to watch her back around?

The apology was at the back of her throat when Tatema said, "I haven't spoken to him in a long time, even before ANBU. The appointment made sense, in hindsight… and not interesting to you." A trick of the light made it seemed as though his ears were pulled back. Which was ridiculous; Tatema wasn't an animal.

"Nii-san, are you afraid of me?" She was suddenly aware they were alone – the ANBU would have gladly sat out. Tatema abruptly stood and approached. He towered over her, and he had been shinobi as long as she had been alive. He had chakra at his disposal, and she did not. He was so close she could smell his cheap, stale aftershave, mixed with sweat… and just a little rotten egg. Sulphur. And a mask would go very well with a complete lack of hair, wouldn't it?

Pointing at one of the lower shelves, Tatema muttered, "Missed a spot," and Tsunade obliged him. When she looked up, he was smiling, but it was the sort of blandness an enemy shinobi would have sported while assessing her threat level. "Sorry, I thought you would prefer that I act as though nothing has happened. But I can be afraid if you wish."

Tsunade spluttered. "What do you mean – so all this time – all this time you played with me, you were nice to me because of my grandfather? My grandmother? Because you're so chivalrous and I'm the _princess_?" Sparks flew as she screamed. Tatema flinched, and it was all it took for her to punch him in the solar plexus, and flew over his crumpled form.

Somehow the ANBU allowed her to go home. The smell of burned jasmine reached her first, and she drew back from the door as it opened. Hōka seemed as surprised as Tsunade felt. "Oh, Mito-sama hadn't expected you to be back so soon."

"Did you get lost on the way to the Uchiha compound," growled Tsunade.

Hōka's smile was out of place on her angular face, like she was borrowing a prettier girl's lips. But Grandma's voice bade them both to come in, so Tsunade bristled past the Uchiha and into the living room. Sure enough, when she entered Sakuya was serving Grandma tea. Like Hōka she was dressed in black, her red mane left unbound and needing to be swept back every few seconds. Tsunade bit back a groan. Great, not one but two on her list of people too familiar to see often.

"These two lovely young ladies are kind enough to spend time with an old lady," said Grandma with her behave-or-else undertone.

"It's what my mother would have wanted," Sakuya said. Right, Kuzunoha-san and Grandma had been childhood friends, and when Grandma moved to Konoha she had followed. Kuzunoha-san was not a rare sight in Grandma's house, and neither was her youngest daughter, Tsunade's sometimes babysitter. The Kyūbi incident had claimed Kuzunoha-san, too. Tsunade wondered how Grandma felt about that.

"So, smuggling an Uchiha into the Senju compound?" And Hōka could not look more like the quintessential Uchiha woman than if she'd been the first Uchiha herself. Dark hair, dark eyes, and well-defined bones… actually, she just looked like she hadn't been eating.

Sakuya sipped her tea, drawing out the seconds before answering. "I don't know about you, but I believed in the Shodai Hokage's way. You know, peace and harmony between the clans."

The Uchiha let out a muffled groan, but it was Grandma's weary sigh that got to them. Sakuya smiled apologetically at her and stood, bowing.

"Sorry, sorry, youthful impetuousness and all that. But I do really and truly admire Hashirama-sama. Anywho, since Tsunade-hime is here, we'll take our leave. Wish you good health and a speedy recovery, Mito-sama."

"Honestly," Hōka mumbled under her breath as the door could be heard opening and closing. She then went to collect the tea set.

"What are you doing?" Tsunade began, but Grandma's cane tripped her before she could snatch the tray.

Hōka said, "At least allow me to carry this to the kitchen."

It was such an obvious ploy to spy on the layout of her house. It was also just weird Hōka, polite as ever to a girl half her size. The kitchen wasn't hidden anyway, nestled in the back of the house as it was. Tsunade had just cleaned it this morning while waiting for the hospital's opening hours, so she let Hōka in. "Why're you here, really? You know Touka-sama doesn't like having your clan in here."

"Ah, we'd thought Kabema-kun's funeral was this morning, but Mito-sama said it was this evening? Either way, we'd been meaning to visit at some point."

She watched Hōka hesitate, then started washing the dishes. Did she know how Kabema had died, and blamed Tsunade for it? "You knew him?"

"He was in our class at the Academy, one of the last ones remaining. Sakuya, Kabema-kun, myself…"

"And that boy who's always with the two of you, your genin teammate?"

"Sagiri," Hōka said. She set the dishes aside, and dried her hands on her shirt. Tsunade held her breath against the vengeful storm of burnt flowers. She had a sinking feeling what Hōka's answer was going to be, but asked about him anyway. "The demon fox got to him, too. So please don't be too hard on Sakuya."

"Oh. Uh, sorry for your loss."

There was an odd shine to her eyes, and as Tsunade braced herself for the awkwardness of tears, the fox raised her heckles. Hōka noticed, and asked what was wrong. She seemed a little skeptical of Tsunade's dismissal, but said, "For what it's worth, I don't blame either you or Mito-sama, and neither does Sakuya. At any rate, my offer still stands. If there's anything I can do…"

Hōka's offer had stood for years, and only she took it seriously. Tsunade started shaking her head, but it occurred to her there was something. "Wait, you're an Uchiha."

"Yes, thank you, I was so close to forgetting – "

Tsunade clucked her tongue. "Oh, stop being petty for a second. You have the fancy wheel eyes." Hōka stared. "The Sharingan, whatever. The only weapon that can subdue the demon fox."

That got her attention. Tsunade quickly explained, in broad terms, of her need to learn to utilise the fox's chakra, and the need for a safety precaution, which was where the Sharingan would come in.

Hōka didn't answer immediately. Her eyes seemed to flatten, becoming incandescent – was she going to demonstrate after all? Finally, she said, "Kabema-kun's sparring accident. It was you."

It didn't sound like an accusation… yet… but Hōka deserved to know what she was getting into, too. Reluctantly, Tsunade said, "The seal isn't perfect, and a bit of its chakra can leak if I'm not careful. I can't afford to lose control again. Ideally I'd train with Hokage-sama, but I can't afford to wait on him either. You won't be doing a favour just to me; you'd be keeping the village safe, too."

"Because I'm an Uchiha, therefore I'm a policewoman," Hōka said sardonically.

Tsunade shrugged. "I wouldn't ask this of just about any Uchiha. But I know you, and you're good. We'll finally be even. Unless you'd rather teach me that nifty fireball trick your clan favours. Oh, or a spare fancy wheel eyeball will do, and then you'll never have to bother with me again."

"Don't push it, kid. But," Hōka added with a wry smile, "I'm glad you're still you." Even so, she would only agreed so far as to proposition the Hokage. Which, fair enough, Tsunade was asking a lot from someone she barely knew, and an Uchiha at that. She let Hōka go after excusing herself to Grandma.


	4. Suggestions and Chicaneries

The entire Senju clan turned up for Kabema's funeral, all of the fifty some people still lingering in the village, even Nawaki. He clung to Tsunade with one hand as the other sneakily tried to loosen his _obi_ , until she squeezed his hand as warning. After wrestling Nawaki into his formal blacks and helping Grandma with hers, Tsunade thought she understood why most kunoichi chose to retire upon marriage (the rush to reach that state, not so much). She still didn't understand why Nawaki had to come along when her brother had to be reminded, just now, that Kabema, the only other descendant of their great-great-grandfather, had existed, at least until Tsunade had ended it. But Grandma had kept the last to herself, and accordingly Tsunade didn't mention how close Nawaki had been to be in Tōka's position.

Tsunade's little family had the front row. She watched Tōka lower a small white box containing all that was left of Kabema the plot marked for her branch of the clan. His shinobi paraphernalia: a sword, a hastily reconstructed porcelain mask still bloody and missing chunks, and a forehead protector. Then on top of the box, the six gold coins for the crossing.

And that was that.

With the hole covered, the entire clan seemed to have found their breath again, and as one they moved into the communion hall where there were food and booze. The most important part of a funeral that she would sadly have to miss due to her responsibilities. The old one was tired and hiding it, the small one was tired and wanted everyone to know about it.

"Can we go home now? I'm sleepy," said Nawaki.

"Sure you are, pipsqueak," replied Tsunade as she handed Grandma to him – or Nawaki to a wry Grandma – and told him to be good.

Kagami had snuck in at the back like a tardy schoolboy. Being the Hokage, though, they couldn't just ignore him, and Tsunade had to rescue him from a persistent auntie and her mortified daughter.

"You're not wearing your robe," observed Tsunade once she had Kagami to herself. Without it and in plain black clothes, he was still tall, dark, and as handsome as any other interchangeable Uchiha man. He wasn't smiling, which took off a lot of the charm.

"I shouldn't be here long. Kabema was one of my ANBU; I'd like to pay my respect to his clan head." He glanced to where Tōka was deep in conversation with several of the older men of the clan.

"Yeah, uh, Tōka-sama's his mother too. They don't look alike, though, so most people don't know unless they're told."

Kagami pushed back a stray bang out of his eye. There was a slope to his shoulders that hadn't existed before his promotion. He seemed to be more tired than Sarutobi ever got to be. Finally, he said, "How are you, Tsunade?"

"Peachy keen," she answered glibly, "and since Mito-obaasama fixed the seal before we left I'm in no danger of blowing up on anyone."

He gave her a stern look. "You are standing before the grave of the man who died to your recklessness. I had hoped you would have had the sense to learn to be more responsible."

So because she was lucky enough to survive everyone decided Kabema was the true victim, even Kagami. Though she wondered why she thought he would be different; the hat seemed to have robbed him of sense of humour.

"Although it's my responsibility, too." Kagami grimaced. "I have some time tomorrow; we can begin your training. But after that…"

"Actually," Tsunade said, "I've asked Hōka to help in case you were busy. With your permission, Hokage-sama."

"Hōka? Setsuna's girl?" Kagami seemed surprised, even concerned.

"Assuming that all that's needed is the Sharingan, she's a pretty good kunoichi. And I'm fairly sure she has absolutely no intentions of finishing what her father started or anything like that." After all, Hōka had gone behind Setsuna's back to rescue Tsunade, therefore dooming her own father, for the First Hokage hadn't taken kindly to the Uchiha ransoming his granddaughter for more power for the clan.

"No. She was exonerated by Hashirama-sensei himself. I didn't realise you were friends." He frowned, then shook his head. "We'll see. If you'll excuse me."

Tōka had approached Grandma, so they wound up going in the same direction anyway. Nawaki had pulled up a branch out of nowhere – oh, right, he could totally do that now – and with an exaggerated look of strain he made the branch grew and popped fresh leaves.

"Ah," said Tōka quietly. "That is indeed something I would like to know. Thank you, Nawaki. And congratulations."

"What do you say to Tōka-sama?" Grandma said.

"Huh? Oh, okay, I'm sorry for your loss!" He said this with a clumsy bow.

Tōka must have known Tsunade was nearby, for she said, "And your sister, is she also sorry?"

Oho, now she cares about apologies, thought Tsunade. Well, Tōka-sama, once returned it's off the table. But Grandma was watching her, so Tsunade bit her tongue.

Grandma said, "Tōka-san, you are grieving. Please don't say anything you would regret later in front of our esteemed Hokage. Good evening, Kagami-sama, I regret I cannot stay. Come, Tsunade."

Tōka nodded distractedly at Kagami, but her focus was still on Grandma. "Wait. Tsunade stays. Ah, Tatema, you will escort Mito-sama home, won't you?" Tatema looked like he'd rather dance with a giant centipede, but Tōka went on. "Tsunade is not a child anymore. It is time she learns her responsibilities."

"Is Tsunade-neechan in trouble?" Nawaki said suddenly, doe eyes aimed at Kagami. "Are you going to punish her? Please don't punish Nee-chan. Nee-chan could be really scary and tough and loud but she's not bad!"

Kagami shot Tsunade a questioning look, but he was genial as he knelt and looked him in the eye, and explained that no, Tsunade hadn't done anything wrong, and she wouldn't be punished. Nawaki wouldn't leave until Tsunade herself chimed in, and saw him off hanging from Tatema's bald head.

With Tōka, the Hokage was all formality: he expressed his condolences, Tōka offered hospitality, and he very regretfully refused. The offer only came once, Tsunade noted – Hokage or not, the Senju was still not too thrilled to have an Uchiha among them. Although she could very well believe Kagami-sama would prefer work to a party.

Thus deserted, Tōka beckoned Tsunade to come with her. "How old are you, Tsunade?"

"Twelve," was the reluctant answer. Tōka had to have known, she was that kind of a clan head.

"Use your head, you stupid girl. What would I gain from harming you?"

The leaves rustled where they went. Like everything else in the village it had been Grandpa's handiwork, and now the graveyard was infested with frangipani and jasmine and all the white and sweetly fragrant flowering trees that ever existed. One squeaked. To Tsunade's disappointment, Tōka ignored the kissing cousins, and went straight inside. There was a table set for the bereaved party, though a lot of them were unoccupied anyway. Tōka sat and continued as though she hadn't been interrupted. "It occurred to me that all this could have been avoided if you had had a proper channel for your boundless energy."

In other words, gossiping. Minutiae of the lives of people whom Tsunade knew theoretically existed within the clan, but never had a reason to talk to. For the night she was Tōka's shadow, seen but not heard unless spoken to, and everyone wanted to speak to her, at least for a little. And because Tōka was the clan head, it was literally everyone, one after another coming to their little corner, an endless stream of condolences to the bereaved and innocuous small talk when it wasn't fearful not-so-subtle glances to Tsunade. There was a constant stream of alcohol too.

If Grandpa had been here, he would have pointed out how admirable Tōka was, doing her duty and caring for everyone else when it was her night to grieve. But he wasn't, Tōka was deep in her cups by now, and Tsunade was sick. Sick of the cloying smell of incense and white chrysanthemum, sick of the laughter in the far-off corner, of the people so used to funerals they were treating each as a night out in a bar. This was surely Tōka's revenge. Tsunade had killed before, but she'd never had to live with the victim's family. Hell was her own clan.

She wished the man in front of her would shut up about Iwa already – who cared what Iwa did in Ame, that far away from Konoha. And wasn't it good Kumo was quiet. Paranoid old loons, the lot of them. The Senju had that in spades, and not enough resourceful young people to actually build the clan.

Heavens, she was starting to sound like Tōka.

Finally they'd run out of sympathisers. Tsunade was startled out of her stupor when Tōka shoved a cup under her nose: sake. Tsunade held her breath in disgust. "Uh, begging your pardon, Tōka-sama, I'm too young – "

"Drink."

Well, she was also too young to defy her mildly drunk clan head. Tsunade took the cup, absently recalling all the poisons that would go well with alcohol. All of them, she decided, no one had ever gotten smarter after imbibing alcohol. There it all went in one go, and only her reflex saved it from coming out the same way.

Tōka snorted. "He used to say it's as bitter as life is sweet. Ah, Hashirama. He was the greatest of us, the last and its best. He gave us a home and a peace, made the stiff-necked Uchiha bend. Hashirama promised the sun and gave us the moon… and look where we are now."

Her head felt warm, so Tsunade did. It was dark outside, though the hall was thoroughly lit. Tsunade could count all the white hair on Tōka's head, all the new lines she hadn't had yesterday. The deadness in her eyes, that was new, too. It was too easy to feel sorry, so Tsunade did. But the words felt clumsy on her tongue, and Tōka spoke first.

"I'd warned him. Strange woman, stranger wife. And I was right. Did you know, Tsunade, the clan has never suffered so many casualties as on your mother's birth? Your grandmother thought she could outwit a demon, and the clan paid for it, as we are still to this day. You will finish what your grandfather started, won't you. The Senju will end with you."

Tsunade gripped the cup tight lest she smashed it on Tōka's face. Within, a fire had uncoiled and reverberated as a cruel laughter. "You know what, I'm not sorry. _Your_ son tried to kill me, his own cousin, at the first sign of trouble. He almost killed _my friends_. I – to hell with you, Tōka-sama, I'd kill you too if you ever threatened the clan."

Tōka's face was a swirl of nauseating smoke, and her voice little better. "But not yourself, I see. No matter. You'll prove it, won't you, princess?" She poured Tsunade another cup. "Finish that, then get out of my sight."

The house was dark and quiet by the time Tsunade stumbled into her room. She collapsed on her bed seconds the instant the funeral clothes were off. That night she dreamed of red skies and burning earth, of a cage emptied twice over, and at the same time surging as a flame unto the heavens. Only gossamer threads kept her tethered to her jail, and away from her hideous, wailing spawn, but nothing kept her from the minions, and eventually the god of shinobi himself. And all around her the village burned…

In the morning when Grandma shook her awake, and the only reason she still had her fingers was that she'd used her cane, now lying in pieces, Tsunade began to think Tōka had a point.

"Did you know the seal was weakened? When you had O-kaasan," she croaked after she had apologised profusely and Grandma had fixed the seal. Even a master like Grandma must have had her blindspots when dealing with something as singular as sealing the demon fox. She hadn't expected Grandma to answer anyway, as Grandma was wont to dissemble on subjects 'unsuitable for children', but the silence was enough. "So you then decided…"

"I underestimated the Kyūbi, and my hubris destroyed the clan – is that what Tōka-san told you? She would be right."

"But O-jiichan must have agreed to it, too," insisted Tsunade. At least, the Kyūbi judged them both guilty, and Grandpa's look of devastation warmed its black heart even as he sealed the fox once again.

"The Shodai Hokage was a powerful and honorable man who had spent his entire life protecting those under his care, often to his own detriment… but even he was only a man. He had wanted children, but had I not convinced him it was not impossible…" Grandma was silent for a while. "Your mother never forgave me, either."

"That's stupid. How did she think she existed long enough to complain?" scoffed Tsunade. Too late, Grandma had withdrawn so far into herself not a single chastisement came. She retreated into her room, and no amount of wheedling and rhetorics would convince her to come out and teach Tsunade fūinjutsu.

All right, then. Grandma wasn't the only fuuinjutsu master who had lived in the house. Grandma might have come into the world a fully-fledged master, but Tsunade's mother had started her shinobi career from the bottom, like a normal kid. A quick expedition into the thousand years of accumulated dust that was her mother's old room revealed a few promising-looking books. And for the second time in two days, promising was all they were. Just like Grandpa's book. It must be in the blood, Tsunade thought sourly, or a prank for the children. Either calligraphy practice or incredibly bad poetry, it was all scribbles to her. Frustrating scribbles that looked as though there was a pattern to the madness if she stared at them until the strokes blurred together. She only needed one thing, one word, sentence, whatever – she was fairly confident she could understand the whole thing once she had the key. In her more fanciful moments she had likened learning to a kaleidoscope. The disparate beads of knowledge she collected along the way, and once she had the appropriate tube to view them in, some kind of image was sure to emerge. Also like a kaleidoscope, the conclusion was sure to be too abstract to properly understand.

Her break came when the ever ubiquitous Silver Rat reared his head, literally, popping into the pane of her window. Kagami wanted to see her in an hour at the entrance to the Forest of Death. But when she got there it was Hōka greeting her, sheepish and alone and definitely not the Hokage. "Kagami-sama would like to apologise," said Hōka, "but he cannot leave his office today."

Since he had at least remembered to send in a replacement, Tsunade swallowed her disappointment. "Yeah, okay, so it's you and a bunch of ANBU, that's cool. Into the Forest we go?"

"Oh, no. We're staying here. It just might be more prudent to stay away from the village proper."

Tsunade looked around for the ANBU. As befitting their reputation, the only reason she knew they were there was logic.

Hōka went on, "Kagami-sama said to start with basic chakra control exercises. We'll see how far you can go before I have to intervene." Tsunade looked back to three tomoe spinning on red eyes. She quickly looked away; she found it hard to trust the Sharingan when the Uchiha used them liberally except on their own.

The Academy didn't delve straight into chakra. There were a few good months spent trying to instill a modicum of discipline into the six year olds. When they could be prevailed upon to sit still for more than a few seconds, the meditation lessons began – finding the inner self, or whatever, she'd never had them. For as long as she could remember, she could already mould chakra. To her it was a lot like singing in its thoughtlessness, and the rest was fine-tuning. She had no idea how to call on her own without the Kyūbi's as well. It was there, claws and fangs pressed against Grandma's seal as though it could sense her anxiety.  
She called up enough chakra to fill her pinky, and the world was drenched in red, and sulphur jostled for every space in her nostrils. She found the ANBU: one in each cardinal direction, all of them buzzing like human-shaped clusters of mosquitoes. She felt herself growling, teeth bared and muscles tensed for a pounce; she knew the feeling was mutual.

Hōka still hadn't made her move. She was the eye of the storm, a lifeless doll. It would be so easy to claw her detestable eyes out…

The next thing Tsunade knew she was lying prone, three dots spinning in her eyes and more in her head. "Did I…" she gasped.

The worry on Hōka's face became clearer. No Sharingan at least. "You went for my face. I know it's not pretty, but it's the only one I have, sorry."

"I don't remember that," Tsunade said after a long moment of frantically searching her memories. With Hōka's help she sat up. A shorter moment of equally frantic searching of the surroundings confirmed the absence of bloody craters or ANBU bodies. Here be progress.

Hōka was watching her closely. "Do you also not remember killing Kabema-kun?"

"I remember his sword in my chest, yes," said Tsunade, petulant. "…but not anything else until after Kagami-sama hit me with genjutsu." Tsunade rolled to her feet, and then up. Her body ached as though she'd crashed through a tree, but Hōka had subdued her with genjutsu, so it had to have been the Kyūbi. Pain and vengeful Sharingan in exchange for a short burst of murderous madness wasn't a fair trade.

Hōka was saying, "Perhaps if you try with less chakra – "

"No, it's gotta be the Sharingan, the Kyūbi hates it. Can you try leaving it off for a bit? Maybe if neither of us weren't provoked I'd have more control."

She did, and the next time Tsunade woke up to grassblades in her nose and a laughter like needles scratching on the bones of her ears. "Shut up," mumbled Tsunade, and flipped to her feet.

Hōka was sporting an angry, blackening gash on her right arm. The Sharingan blared as she clumsily moved through the set of hand seals for Shōsen no jutsu. The burgundy glow of her chakra fizzled the moment it made contact with the wound.

Tsunade clucked her tongue. "The seals are only half of it," she began, fingers already in the rat position before her brain caught up. Even if she could work the technique without the Kyūbi taking over, she would only pour more poison into Hōka.

One of the ANBU stepped forward then, unsurprisingly it was Silver Rat. He brought up his hands, coated with medical chakra, and at Hōka's nod he set to heal. It wasn't a bad attempt at all, he knew to extract the poisonous chakra first before healing the more superficial wounds. He was so good, in fact, that Tsunade found it suspicious she'd never seen a man matching his general profile in the hospital. Hōka thanked him, and just like that he disappeared again, with only a whiff of sulphur as proof of his presence.

"Well," Hōka said, testing her arm. Not all the black spots had disappeared, and her motions were stiff. "that was enlightening. Medic-nin always makes it look so easy, even under the scrutiny of the Sharingan. What's wrong?"

Tsunade schooled her face. "Nothing." One day, she thought, one day she would invent medical ninjutsu even idiots could use. But first she must regain her sanity. "Uh, what happened this time?"

"Besides you laughing at me, taunting me, and baiting the ANBU – did you know that Kagami-sama forbade them from interfering unless I'm in mortal danger?" That would explain the unprecedented level of sulphur in the air. "The red chakra seemed to make you much faster and stronger than the average jounin."

Tsunade bit her lip. "If you don't want to do this anymore…"

Hōka shook her head and smiled. "Oh, no, you just caught me off-guard. And there's something to be said about the Uchiha and our over-reliance on the Sharingan. You'd know, Senju." She grimaced. "Frankly, I'm more concerned by the loss of consciousness… that's the Kyūbi taking over, isn't it."

"Yeah, about that. Can you do your ocular chicanery now, while I'm still me?"

"Ocular – Tsunade, it's called _suggestion_. The Kyūbi is so vulnerable to the Sharingan that is all it takes. And I have never heard of doujutsu effecting things invisible to it, but… yes, why not."

Red eyes flashed, and Tsunade made herself stare at the spinning tomoe. Suggestion, hypnosis. She felt calm, the Kyūbi quiet. Then she drew her chakra, and the Kyūbi followed. Sarutobi's seal was a suggestion too, a sponge yoke tethered by steel chains. The burden was on her shoulders, and when she tugged the demon fox tugged back, plunging her into a sea red and vast. The abyss stared back at her balefully; above in the red sky a crow demon glared over its long nose. She began paddling. The sea was tame, and after a while her head broke its surface and breathed in rancid air. Sulphur and cooked meat on her tongue, and a hive of termites under her skin. No wonder the Kyūbi flattened every civilisation it came across.

Hōka's voice came as though through red cotton candy. "… awfully quiet. Blink twice if you want to be knocked out, thrice if – "

"Hey Uchiha, don't blink," was all the warning she gave before Tsunade rushed, chakra leaping to her knuckles readily. How did she ever have trouble with it? She was faster than she'd ever been, and she didn't even have to sacrifice her awareness. The ANBU buzzing angrily in place, bound by their orders; Hōka's surprise and delicious panic. The plan had been to strike the ground, but why not test her newfound reflexes – better than the average jounin, i.e. Hōka, wasn't she. And would it be so bad if the world lost a couple of Sharingan today… and if they disintegrated this sack of rotting flesh, it would be painful, but she would be free at last…

Lightning slashed across her vision, cleaving her head into two. Then nothing, as though she no longer had a body. But slowly a few things: cold metal pressed against the nape of her neck, the three ringed blades scrambling her thoughts like a blender. A tengu's frigid, shrill voice. "… masquerading. Had your fun yet, demon?"

Panic seized Tsunade – who the hell had she killed this time? She had retained full control! Her thoughts had been hers. It had been her idea to tease Hōka, to blow off her frustration. The stuff sparring accidents were made of, as Kabema's ashes could attest to. Despair set in as she realised there was no slip; there was nothing to control. What was the point? The more she tried the easier she became the demon instead. Tsunade's very being was intertwined with the Kyūbi.

Somehow she managed to speak through the thick sheet of burnt jasmine suffocating her. "Then kill me! Kill me, and the demon dies with me."

"Oh, no, I'll not be the fool who unleashed the Kyūbi on Konoha. Besides, I actually like the little princess when she's not trying to gouge out my eyes, and I shouldn't dare to heap more sorrows unto Mito-sama."

Despite herself, Tsunade scoffed. "You're such an embarrassment to your clan."

The red sea receded, she could breathe easier, but Tsunade didn't have the strength to move. She lied there basking in the simple smell of grass. The fox was laughing at her, but who cared what the fox did from behind the Sharingan's protection. Coward.

Still face down, Tsunade mumbled, "Did I kill anyone?"

"Just an ant nest. Those poor ants never stood a chance," Hōka said soothingly. She couldn't seem to decide on what to do with her hand and let it hover over Tsunade's head. "You ought to see a medic."

"'mfine, can't go into the hospital anyway, too poisonous. Director said so." To prove her point, Tsunade tried to get up. She got as far as flipping to her back and flinching at the sunlight in her eye. Chancing peeks got her a view of not one but three craters. No blood, though, and no broken bodies. More progress.

"No hospital, got it, but – excuse me," Hōka said with a rising tone as a larger set of fingers wrapped around Tsunade's wrist, seeking pulse, followed by the gentle invasion of sulphur-tinged medical chakra. Silver Rat, here to assassinate her, medic-nin style. And get poisoned by the Kyūbi's chakra. But the foreign chakra only probed and prodded, and then returned to the ANBU, who didn't seem affected by the brief contact.

Silver Rat grunted something to Hōka, then disappeared. "Well, ANBU-san couldn't find anything wrong. That said, I still don't think we should continue."

"No," echoed Tsunade. She sat up, then wobbled to her feet.

Grinning, Hōka offered her arm. "We'll try something else tomorrow. Come on, princess, let's take you home. I'd like to speak to Mito-sama if she's available."


	5. Senju Saika

To get to the Senju clan compound from the Forest of Death, one must pass through nearly all the other named clan compounds in Konoha, except for the Uchiha's on the east end, and the burgeoning civilian sector. A Yamanaka had recently opened a florist's and Hōka wanted to see what all the hullaballoo was about. Since it was early yet, and today's training session only seemed to have galvanised Tsunade, she tagged along. She was thinking of buying daisies for Orochimaru. He would mock her sentimentality, but heavens did she miss his acerbic cluelessness. Hell, after a week of fruitless training she would even take Jiraiya's annoying cluelessness.

Her moods brightened fractionally when she saw Kagami emerging from the Yamanaka florist's anyway. She almost didn't recognise him at first. The lack of Hokage regalia and an Uchiha-certified bland fashion helped, but he had apparently tried to tame his curly hair, which now spitefully sprang all over the place. But also something of him reminded her of Nawaki when she caught him sneaking out of her room.

Tsunade called to him first. Kagami seemed almost reluctant to talk to them. "Tsunade, and… Hōka. Back from training, I see."

Was he asking for a report, even incognito? Tsunade said, "Yes, sir. We made incremental progress where we could." Which was to say, Tsunade lasted all of one second as herself when she used chakra. Fearing that they were wearing the seal, the last few training sessions had been spent in fruitless meditation to no avail. But she didn't go berserk from just seeing the Sharingan, so it was progress all the same.

"Progress is good," Kagami said distractedly. Tsunade almost missed the odd glance he exchanged with Hōka. It was then she noticed the pot of bonzai bamboo snuggled in the crook of his arm, mostly hidden from view by his posture.

"Oh, looking for decoration for your office, Hokage-sama?" she said.

"Ah, this is –" He cleared his throat. "I am the Hokage now, and a poor leader I would be if I am ignorant of the proceedings of my people. Hashirama-sensei always started the day with walk through the village, from one end to another. And he would talk to everyone he met. Well, the village was much smaller back in the day, but I intend to follow the spirit, if not the letter."

He looked down at the pot in his hand. It was a simple clay pot, and the bamboo straight and uncomplicated, the three of them loosely connected by a red ribbon. "And this is… for you," he said, presenting it to Hōka without quite looking at her.

"O-oh! Thank you," Hōka didn't seem to know what to do with the gift, or her gaze for that matter. The awkwardness between them was so palpable Tsunade didn't need the Kyūbi's senses rustling under her tongue to notice.

"By the way, Kagami-sama," Tsunade said, "since you're already incognito, would you like to visit your poor, ailing student with me? As his teacher I'm sure you must have visited him – " Actually, Tsunade was pretty sure Kagami hadn't. " – but I'm forbidden from entering the hospital. But as you can see I'm no danger to anyone as is, so I'm sure if you talk to the Director she would agree."

"I don't make a habit of undermining the Director," Kagami said sternly, though he softened a little. "But we'll see. Right now I want you to come with me."

Hōka excused herself then, more demure than polite. Tsunade wondered briefly if she had just witnessed a rare glimpse of the Uchiha courtship in the wild. Kagami was getting too old to remain a bachelor, but with Hōka? Granted he was not old enough to be her father yet. She hurried after him to his office.

Shimura Danzō was waiting for them. He stood at rest behind the Hokage's desk surveying the village. Out of Sarutobi's coterie Tsunade saw Danzō the least. Her impression of him was that he fancied himself the Hokage's shadow, appearing only when Sarutobi needed opposition the least.

Danzō said, "None of the flowers are to her highness's liking, I take it."

Kagami glowered at his back. "Don't stand in the light too long, Danzō; you might just melt."

Danzō snorted and gestured to the Hokage regalia draped on the chair as though it was wearing them. "Pressed and cleaned, o Hokage-sama, although unfortunately it lacks a certain… feminine touch."

Kagami strode and wore the cloak and fastened the hat on his head, then took it off and put it on the desk, and then after contemplating he put it back on. "I suppose for now Tsunade will help me with that, won't you, Tsunade?"

Danzō finally turned and cocked an eyebrow at her as she mumbled noncommittally. He snorted. "Do try to remember that the Taki delegate is also due to arrive in a few hours."

Kagami adjusted his cloak, and then the hat again. Tsunade didn't have the heart to tell him it left his hair mussed. "Thank you, Danzō. Whatever will I do without you?"

A few moments passed with an anticipatory overcast in the room, despite the bright sunny day outside. The spell was only broken when Jiraiya sauntered in, preening and theatrics akimbo.

"Chuunin Jiraiya has returned! Obstacles overcome, enemies thwarted, the princess has now arrived safe and sound. Presenting the one and only Senju Saika-sama!"

With Jiraiya as the thunderclap, a heavy downpour descended on Tsunade. Kagami's expected guest seemed almost embarrassed she didn't live up to Jiraiya's enthusiasm. Only her red hair stood out like hearth fire, with none of the warmth in her eyes. Saika stepped into the room with the grace of a porcelain vase, chin held high, the whisker-like birthmarks on her cheeks bared for all.

"You're alive," Tsunade blurted in wonderment.

Saika flinched ever so slightly, visibly forcing herself to look at Tsunade and faked a smile. "Tsunade! Why, I almost didn't recognise you… You've grown so much."

Tsunade scoffed. "Yeah, I heard children tend to do that while you're not looking. Imagine that, in six years the baby is almost a ninja."

Birthmarks like whiskers stood stark against the flush of her cheeks, but just as soon Saika had control of her expression again. "We'll talk later," she said coolly. With more grace she bowed to Kagami. "Hokage-sama. I believe congratulations, and my condolences for poor Hiruzen-kun, are in order."

Kagami cleared his throat. "Yes, well, thank you. And allow me to extend our welcome to you as the Hokage." He looked like he wanted to say something else, but caught Danzō's eye and instead said, "I trust that your journey went well."

"Oh, very well indeed. You have excellent shinobi under your command. Jiraiya-kun in particular has been a delight." All the warmth that had been absent when she'd spoken to Tsunade suffused her every word now. Jiraiya, initially preening, withered a little under Tsunade's glare.

Kagami, Tsunade noticed, hadn't taken his eyes off Saika for a while. Nodding absently, he dismissed Jiraiya and the jounin hanging at the back. Then he got to Tsunade and paused. "And Tsunade, you wished to visit Orochimaru. Go on ahead, you have my permission."

Tsunade glared suspiciously at Saika. There was a thunderstorm building and threatening to dribble out of her ears, but Kagami said her name more forcefully. Reminded of Kagami's magical pinwheel eyes, Tsunade scurried out.

She nearly bumped into Jiraiya eavesdropping outside. He took one look at her face and said, "Hey, whoa, I was just wondering if you'd want to see Orochimaru together."

Tsunade nodded. She breathed in, out, chakra circulating without touching the red-tainted core. She thought of Orochimaru, pale and bloody in her red-tinted vision. The pressure abated, then peaked again as Jiraiya said, "But y'kno, at least your mum turned out to be alive – "

"You can have her," snapped Tsunade, and left, Jiraiya following closely.

By the time they reached the hospital she had cooled somewhat. A nurse stopped her at the entrance, however. Tsunade was prepared to deploy her best ingenue impression but for a new medic-nin who suddenly appeared. Tsunade had never seen him – she would remember a silver-haired pretty boy not much older than her – but the nurse seemed all too happy to pass the buck.

"I was just about to check on Orochimaru-kun myself," he said after introducing himself as Dan, Katou Dan at your service.

"So Orochimaru's awake then?" asked Jiraiya.

"Awake and bored out of his wits for a couple of days now," Dan said. He had an easy voice, but Tsunade tasted rotten egg as he added, "His physical recovery is most assured."

Tsunade challenged him. "And this 'other' recovery would be…"

Perfect white teeth flashing, Dan said, "Forgive me if I insinuated anything untoward. Orochimaru-kun is my first assignment; if I am a little… attached, I'm sure you'd understand."

Not really, no, thought Tsunade, she didn't understand how someone this young could have been a full-fledge medic-nin. And this handsome. But mostly his youth, and gender made him an unusual sight within the crusty walls of the hospital. The medic-nin corps drew a salary, a paltry sum compared to the contracts a reasonably dedicated field shinobi of an equal skill could grab. And the entry bar was rather high for medic-nin to begin with. Too, for an equal or even more harrowing time, medicine promised all the guts and none of the glory of field missions.

Dan went on, "We have had cases where only the patient's willpower rescued them from death. Yet I cannot help but think that the reverse must be true: there will come a day where our best efforts are powerless to help a spirit lost in darkness."

The taste of bile stopped Tsunade from responding, but bewildered, Jiraiya said, "Is this about Orochimaru? What's wrong with him?"

Silver hair fluttered prettily under sunlight as Dan turned, green eyes cool as the bottom of a frozen river locked on Tsunade's. "As I said, he would recover. Though we can never measure to Hashirama-sama, we can accomplish this much. This time. Ah, here we are."

Orochimaru had a room in the dangerous chakra mishap ward by himself. Still swathed in a head to toe attire of dressings, he was staring at the ceiling when they entered, and was slow in looking over. Big, yellow eyes scrutinised Tsunade up and down, and as much as Tsunade reminded herself he was inscrutably weird at the best of days, Tsunade still held her breath.

Then he said, "Oh, it's just you," and Jiraiya seized the opportunity to needle him with, "What the hell, don't sound so disappointed," and Tsunade sighed quietly. Dan worked quickly, if he did his job at all, and declared all was well, and left, or rather made a show thereof.

Jiraiya scooted closer, whistling. "Wow, they sure did a number on you."

"They would not tell me how," Orochimaru said, as close to whining as he would ever get.

"I'll tell them to let you heal on your own, so you may observe." Tsunade leafed through the chart at the bottom of his bed. Signed by Dan. Huh. It looked good, as best as she could tell. Orochimaru was no longer intubated, at least. "Look, you're all set to be let out in a few days. What?"

Only Orochimaru would intensify his gaze upon being called on it. "Come to finish the job?"

Tsunade was just replacing the clipboard to its place, and fortunately (or unfortunately) had nothing else to crush in her hands. Jiraiya had gone very still, sitting on the chair next to him. Together the two boys were a bed of corpse flower, the sweetness rapidly overwhelmed by the stench of decay.

He had the right to be… whatever Orochimaru was being. Stabbed, and then poisoned by the very person he'd taken the sword for tended to grow certain powerful feelings in people.

Right now he was a patient, and Tsunade slipped into her hospital persona with some effort. "Don't be a twit just because I forgot to bring you flowers. Look, I… I'm sorry that I put you here, all right? And… thanks," the last she mumbled.

"That doesn't convince me that you weren't the demon fox."

"And you're in your top form, I see."

"Great, so now that that's established," Jiraiya said quickly before either could shoot back, "look, souvenirs from Uzushio! Let's all marvel at my generosity! Say, 'thank you, Jiraiya'."

Orochimaru just stared at the raggedy book placed on his bedside, boasting a title in nonsense characters. For Tsunade it was a glass ball the size of her palm. Within it sand was shored up on one side, and lapping water on the other. The surface rose and receded, the sea in miniature. Which didn't seem far off the mark. Silver gossamer threads of chakra suffused the sea water, gently tugging it through a million part dance.

"Awesome, ain't it? It's sea water made to think that the moon is closer. Yeah it sounds stupid but poetry sounds stupid. Anyway, I made it myself. Okay, so Saika-hime helped a little. Fine, she helped a lot – "

"How, by staring sadly until it moved out of pity? My mother couldn't even make it past genin." Princess Saika, master of fuuinjutsu. Hilarious. To be sure it wasn't Jiraiya's handicraft – it only smelled a little like petrichor, his personal way of offending the demon fox's senses.

"You have a mother?" Orochimaru said, as though Tsunade had just claimed the moon was her mother.

She crossed her arms. "No, I burst out of a rock golden and fabulous. What's gotten into you?"

Orochimaru just gave her a look. Tsunade shrugged. "Besides the demon fox chakra, and I've apologised for that."

In his silence Orochimaru hissed, and rattled and spat. It took a moment for Tsunade to guess what had him sulking. The absurdity caught her off guard. Orochimaru, feeling betrayed by… nothing that affected him whatsoever. And what did he imagine she would lie for anyway?

"But, hey, so," Jiraiya said quickly, and Tsunade gladly shifted her attention to him. "Tsunade, while I was away you didn't get too much trouble with your clan, did you? That ANBU assassin dude was her cousin, the clan head's son," he explained for Orochimaru's benefit. The latter now looked at her with a new light. A new, dim light. Beyond the door, a different sort of light, yellow and noxious, lit up. For an ANBU, Silver Rat was really bad at hiding his presence.

But they were comrades, a voice that sounded too much like Grandma whispered, and you, even you were ready to burn Konoha for Orochimaru's sake, odd little prick though he is.

She shook her head, both to clear her mind and answer the question. "Maybe if I were anyone but the Shodai Hokage's granddaughter." And, until recently, the hope of the clan. Tsunade was neither stupid nor blind; that made this all so much harder to bear. Damn Kabema. Damn the fox. Her own recklessness? She regretfully added that to the tally as well.

"Lured you into a false sense of security," Orochimaru said.

"Oh, here we go," Jiraiya muttered as Tsunade asked, with no little incredulity, "Who did?"

Orochimaru looked at her as though she was a particularly dim-witted species. "Your assassin – your cousin had aimed his blade at you from the moment you stepped onto the training field that day. Laid out a minor genjutsu so you noticed even less." He sounded smug. Even lying bed-bound wouldn't stop Orochimaru from lording over his aptitude with genjutsu, and her utter lack of it. "The Kyūbi breaking out of its cage was a coincident, if convenient excuse."

Jiraiya said, "But… why? She was more useless than an Academy student then."

Tsunade glared at him, but Orochimaru answered simply, "To dispose of the Kyūbi. A demon of destruction kept in check by a volatile vessel. Why not?"

"But…" Jiraiya cast a worried glance at her. "…we don't know if it'd die with her. What if it'd only set the Kyūbi free to rampage on the village?"

"It's a worthy end on its own, and nevertheless, we don't know."

"I don't care," Tsunade said heavily, "Who cares if he thought he was doing good. He was still an asshole. He's my cousin – the closest thing I have to an older brother, and he wanted me dead." She sneered. "Well, he's dead now. I'm sick of talking about Kabema. Jiraiya! You went to Uzushio!"

Jiraiya brightened at the rare invitation to narrate. "I sure did. Did you know it was literally hidden in whirlpools?"

Tsunade was only half listening, and judging by his bored expression so was Orochimaru. She didn't know what to make of his wild imagination. Orochimaru's curiousity of the human body, just a small part of an unquenchable thirst, stopped just short of the intangible. The motivation of his would be killer wouldn't have been worthy of his musings, even sick and lonely, unless he was convinced there was more. Like a conspiracy. Or whatever. Nothing Tsunade would want to discuss with an overzealous ANBU just behind the door.

Jiraiya, though, hadn't been allowed to proceed past a section of Uzushio meant for visitors. His best embellishments dried soon enough, so they parted: Orochimaru to his book, Jiraiya to a proper debriefing with the Hokage, and Tsunade… home. Eventually.

Orochimaru's ward was sequestered at the farthest edge of the hospital. Ward being an honorary title, for it was only a handful of small rooms. Tsunade had never been here; as far as she knew they were hastily carved into the building to handle the victims of the last Kyūbi outbreak. The Sarutobi clan's doton pecialists worked mighty magic when needs must.

She poked her head into the last room. Dan looked up from where he was very seriously straightening a bed's sheet. "Hullo, Tsunade-hime. How can I help you?"

Dan had a silky voice. It was pleasant to listen to, and deceptively firm. Silky hair, too. The face wasn't too bad either; she would go so far as to say he was pretty. And he was a full-fledged medic-nin, while looking not much older than Hōka, and Tsunade knew for sure Hōka wasn't old enough to drink yet. It seemed only fair that he had a perennial fog of rotten egg about him. Nobody should be so perfect.

Tsunade crossed her arms and said, "You know, my grandfather wasn't the kind of man so desperate for laud as to demand everyone remain inept. That we, as a corps, haven't yet surpassed him would have him weeping."

He tilted his head, a bland and insincere smile plastered on. "I'm sorry if I have offended you."

"You're not really Orochimaru's doctor, are you? Here to finish what your buddy Kabema started, eh?"

"I'm afraid I don't understand," Dan said, but Tsunade was already pulling out a kunai from her sleeve. Under his wide-eyed stare she gouged her wrist. A clean, straight cut along the major vein, missing all the other critical tissues. Blood spurted and dirtied the hospital's pristine white floor, her clothes, crimson flecks sticking to her eyelashes. Unattended to, she could bleed her heart out in minutes – though Tsunade doubted the Kyūbi would let it come to that. She fancied it was already igniting her bone marrow into producing more blood. Either way a mere novice medic-nin shouldn't have known about it at all, only that a crazy girl was dying.

She made a noise at the back of her throat, not quite a growl, when Dan made no move. She thought he might wait until the Kyūbi fixed its host and embarrass her. The blood loss was starting to take its toll. Light-headed, Tsunade lied on the bed like an ingenue, a patient. Her right arm dangled on the side, raining still. Dan's face spasmed in abject hatred before settling on bland professionalism. He jerked as if to rummage in the cabinet for bandages, but she said, "Are you a medic-nin or not, Dan-sensei? Do you want to put on your rat mask first?"

Then he was there, chartreuse chakra pouring into the gaping wound like molten rock. Like Silver Rat's chakra when he had examined her after every training session with Hōka. The ANBU wore their masks as a political gesture of their loyalty to the Hokage before their clans of origin. Though perfect anonymity impossible, it was still considered a taboo to unveil a member of the shadowy, but honorable corps. It was still satisfying to see Dan drop the veneer of professional politeness in favor of disgust, and hatred. There, as clear to the Kyūbi's senses as to her human ones, was that so hard?

Dan worked quickly, but efficiently, she had to admit. He used as little chakra as he could get away with. A short burst for sanitation, then a more concentrated effort to coax the vein walls to knit themselves together. And none for anesthetics, the jerk. But just as soon he withdrew. The Kyūbi had decided to stop messing around and put her back together, it seemed.

"Kabema was right; this is all a game to you." His lips quirked ironically. "Princess."

Tsunade returned the gesture in kind. "So it was his idea, then? And you… I remember you. You know, I've always thought it was miraculous Kagami got there as quick as he did, and Mito-obāchan after him. Minimised the damage. That was you, wasn't it? So Kabema told you, and you… fetched the right people in case he failed, or delivered them to be the first sacrifice."

"A riveting story," drawled Dan. "I have told Hokage-sama all he needed to know." By his tone he seemed to expect her to beg for scraps. Tsunade crinkled her nose in response. "As you can see, he saw fit to assign me as your security detail."

So Kagami did. And his rodent sword, when presented with a neat excuse to have her dead – Tsunade could picture him bowing, pleading she was too fast, Hokage-sama, and the demon fox betrayed her – Dan had kept her alive. For now. But she could, probably, rest assured in the knowledge that the Hokage didn't want her dead, and this particular ANBU was faithful. Though judging by the unceasing sulphuric fume not without a lot of internal struggle.

"So Kabema…"

"Your friend survived; you have avenged him. Kabema is now dead. Are you not tired of talking about him, princess? I wouldn't wish to annoy you."

"Shut the hell up." She would have punched his pretty face if he hadn't kept her arm hostage. "Do you even care – if he'd succeeded – have you even asked Tatema – " He poked the pink skin, raw enough that his finger went through and tore through the recovering blood vessel. Tsunade snarled.

"Fascinating," he murmured, and left her. He returned with bandages and a piece of medic-nin's robe. He cleaned the blood there, and also her face with surprising gentleness. Then he bandaged her arm, told her to change, and closed the curtain around her bed. Semi-transparent fabric in the way, he said, "The world might have been rid of a dangerous demon and a spoiled princess. The demon fox might have razed Konoha to the ground. Does it matter? He's no longer here to satisfy your curiousity."

So that was it, then. Dan, the Kyūbi, even Kagami… how reassuring that she was only kept alive because nobody wanted to gamble on her death.

Dan wanted her to stay for further observation. Since Tsunade didn't have anything else to do – and going home would mean facing Saika – she obliged. She was feeling a little dizzy, and exhausted from the fox's healing, and what's a little shut eye…

Tsunade didn't remember when she'd dozed off. But when she woke up she was still in the hospital, the same room, although apparently in a different, cleaner bed. She had been awakened by the sound of her stomach growling. That wouldn't have been so bad if Dan wasn't sitting by her side, reading a thin book with pulpy title and munching on a bun. By all appearance he was a concerned visitor dressed as an ANBU. The rat mask rested on his lap. Without looking up from his book he pointed to a cart bearing hospital food. It was parked on her left, the side with the injured arm. Her face heated, and she glared at him, but as her stomach made its displeasure known a second time she took the – apology? sacrificial offering? – grudgingly. The arm no longer hurt, and it didn't protest as she lifted the tray to herself. The Kyūbi wasn't completely useless after all.

"You watched me sleep? How is an ANBU not like a pervert?" she asked.

Dan shrugged, turning another page. Tsunade sniffed the offering, more out of concern with freshness than toxicity. She took a mouthful, and confirmed that it was indeed bland, healthy hospital ration.

He waited until she'd gobbled all of it before saying, "I have a sister about your age. She's hungry all the time."

"Uh-huh. I bet she's cute."

"She's also at that age where she can't stand men for more than three seconds. Including her older brother."

"So you're hanging out with me instead? That doesn't make you sound creepy at all."

He smiled beatifically, then dove behind his book. "Was Tatema another one of your cousins? Sounds like another one in the series: Tatema, Kabema, Hashirama, Tobirama."

"Kabema never mentioned him?"

"It was never relevant to the mission." Tsunade wanted to ask him what mission, but he said, "Should he have?"

"Well, if Kabema ever knew anything it was because Tatema had told him. In fact, I'll talk to him, and you'll eavesdrop like the stalker you are."

Even as she said so Tsunade was already taking off; her shadow followed not a second later. This was Konoha, so she barely drew notice streaking through the village in broad daylight, dyed in blood. The Senju compound was once again deserted. No faux-concerned relatives stopped her. Tatema's father had left his house too, for once, and Tatema himself was not in the archives.

She did, however, nearly run into Saika. The rate at which Saika paled, once the initial surprise wore off, could outrace an exsanguinated patient. "Tsunade! What happened?" she said breathlessly, red eyes taking her in like a search light. It shone in alarm at her arm. Her hand shot as if to throttle Tsunade, abruptly halting to caress air instead.

Tsunade waved, bandages and all, to Saika's visible consternation. "Got a bit careless is all. And you? Have you even seen O-bāchan? Nawaki? Does his name ring a bell?"

Even as the rest of her became smudged Saika's whiskers lit up. What were those things anyway? They were too smooth to be scars. Saika said, "I… There was something I needed to… I have been away for a while – "

"Half of my life, and Nawaki's entire life. What's another few minutes, eh? Or never, I'm sure no one can tell the difference." Tsunade turned to leave.

"Wait!" Saika pleaded, and the pathetic note scratched her ears so much Tsunade did. "I realise I haven't been a good mother to you, or Nawaki. I'm sorry. I truly am. I never meant to take so long – "

"Therefore, naturally, you never wrote."

"It was… necessary. I went to Uzushio – to our homeland – to study under the greatest fuuinjutsu master. Your great-grandfather. As part of the training I was to not have any contact with the outside world until it was completed. I don't have your talent, or your grandparents'. But even so I had meant to return in a year, at most two. Not six."

"You shouldn't have to return at all."

Saika went silent, dispersing in sunlight as though she was a fog. Then she pulled herself together and said, "Could you find it in yourself to come inside with me? There's something you need to know."

She went first, but Tsunade hung back. "Hey, stalker-sensei," she said out of the corner of her mouth, "Your orders are to watch for my safety, right? Surely a hunky ANBU such as yourself can do that from the outside. This is secret clan stuff, you understand."

She didn't think he would agree, especially after her little breach of etiquette in the hospital. But a chartreuse likeness of a man flared behind her eyes, and very slowly and deliberately retreated. It perched on the roof of Tatema's house. Still within sight of the archives, but far enough. Tsunade gave him a thumbs up.

It was pure curiosity that made Tsunade follow. The archives was as small and musty with the weight of history. Tatema had gone through with the rearrangement of the books, but everything else was the same. Saika was drawn to the empty wall at the end, and Tsunade followed suit. Saika laid her palm on the surface, muttering voicelessly to herself. Then she asked for a kunai, and Tsunade took one out and sliced her own palm. Saika let out a small gasp.

Tsunade barely restrained herself from rolling her eyes. The only child of the man they called the god of shinobi, and she acted like a delicate civilian. Was this really her mother? She stuck the bloody palm on the wall. It seemed to come alive, and hungry. It sapped more of her blood, but before she could withdraw her hand the blood ran on the wall. A thousand red worms turned ancient racing to the edges, and then dying. The dried husks formed some sort of a drawing… no, a writing, except they were not any characters she knew. But even as she thought so she started reading, the meaning making itself known to her mind.

This was truth itself. The origins and history of the shinobi world, and its destiny. So absorbed was she that Saika had to hold her shoulder to get her attention. "What do you see?"

"It's… can't you read?"

"No. At present it's speaking only to your blood."

Tsunade snorted, but told her anyway. It was a story. Humanity wrought in eternal war, the rabbit goddess from the moon and the demon tree, the mother of all chakra. And all shinobi, apparently. The mythical Sage of Six Paths and his sons, the just-so stories to explain the Uchiha and Senju's eternal feud.

There was something about the Sage's teachings too, but Saika said, "What about the bijū?"

"Uh… the Rikudo Sennin split the Juubi into nine smaller tailed beasts with his Rinnegan – great, more potential doujutsu for the Uchiha – and chucked the remaining husk to the moon. Nine of them, really? Just one is a pain in the ass."

"Not all of them are as destructive as the Kyūbi, although they are certainly not human. Civilisations fell at their whims. Though in the end the Shodai Hokage subdued them all. Contained each in a jinchūriki, fashioned after Obā-chan."

"What, all nine of them?"

"Your Ojī-chan then made the bijū gifts for the other hidden villages, so they wouldn't go to war. Even one as small as Taki. They had sent an assassin after him, because they were small and desperate. He defeated the assassin, effortlessly, I was given to believe. But visiting the village, he was moved into sympathising with their plight. He gave them the Nanabi, so that they could stand against the larger villages."

Somehow it was this deed, and not his subjugation of nine primordial chakra demons, that propelled Grandpa into mythical territory for Tsunade. Saika said, "Well, they've lost their jinchūriki. The Takikage was just here begging for Kagami-kun's help."

"Well, that's stupid. But whoever wrote this wanted 'the heirs of the body' to take care of them. Did Ojī-chan know?"

A strange look passed through Saika's face. "He never talked to me about it. It was Tobirama-ojisama who showed me, although neither of us could unlock it."

Tsunade withdrew her hand. The writing faded in an instant, leaving a smooth stone wall. "So you came back for this."

Saika blew a long, pained sigh. "I came back for you, Tsunade. You, and Nawaki, were the reason I left. In time Obā-chan will die, but the Kyūbi might not die with her. And the Kyūbi of all bijū will not stay quiet after such a long and humiliating incarceration. Obā-chan believed it must be contained, and I'm inclined to agree. Yet it is only her Uzumaki blood that made her fit to be a jinchūriki, the same blood that flows through me to you and Nawaki. It's a wretched life, being a jinchūriki. I couldn't bear it. I had to leave. I had to learn, and seek a better answer.

"My poor daughter. I've failed you. The demon fox should never have been your inheritance. Please forgive your useless mother… please give me a chance to fix this."

* * *

 _The bit with Hashirama and Taki and the Nanabi was borrowed from EndoplasmicPanda with permission._

 _I haven't been putting up notes because, haha, self, why so pretentious. But I might as well:_

 _1\. On names: Hashirama and his brothers followed a naming convention of household item + ma (間, loosely translated as space). I'm simply extending the convention to an entire branch of the Senju family beginning with Hashirama's great-grandfather. Kabema is written 壁間 (wall+space) and Tatema 盾間 (shield+space)._

 _For the women, the third databook gave Tōka's name as 桃華, or peach flower. Flowery names wouldn't be amiss for Hashirama's descendant, so Tsunade's phantom Senju parent was born Saika 彩華, or colored/painted flower. Yes, probably the same Sai whose weapon was painting. Hōka, on the other hand, has nothing to do with flower. 放火 is a set that means setting fire, and 砲火 means gundpowder. Perfectly good Uchiha name, right? So her father, Setsuna, named her 蜂窩 or beehive, also pronounced the same, because he found the baby's cry shrill and annoying._

 _2\. Let's pretend for a moment that the Sage wrote a tablet for the Senju too, and the contents are pretty much the same so I didn't have to write more exposition._

 _3\. Dan's little sister is Shizune's mother, who in canon died and gave Dan the motivation to advocate Tsunade's ideas - and a dead sibling to bond over with Tsunade. We have no age for her, although she can't have been too much younger given Shizune's own age._

 _4\. Saika should be the last major OC for a while._


End file.
